


the second time burns like the first

by Royalwriter



Series: BeauJester Week 2019 [2]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Anxiety, Canon Backstory, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Prison, slight spoilers for beau's backstory, theyre in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-26
Updated: 2019-07-26
Packaged: 2020-07-19 23:44:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19982515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Royalwriter/pseuds/Royalwriter
Summary: Beau and Jester get arrested for being too rowdy. Being trapped in a prison cell with someone she loves is too reminiscent of past experiences for Beau's comfort.





	the second time burns like the first

**Author's Note:**

> Second fic of Beaujester week! This one's a little shorter but I hope you guys like it!

They’d gotten arrested, and Beau is hardcore panicking.

She knows, rationally, that she’s panicking, and should calm down and stop pacing the too-small cell that she and Jester are trapped in. There’s techniques for it, shit the monks taught her, shit she taught herself to fix problems like this, but right now, if she stops moving, she’ll die.

So she doesn’t stop moving.

They need to get out, right now. They need to leave before anything else can happen, before someone can split them up, convince Jester that Beau set this up, somehow— move both of them so far away from each other that they’ll never see each other again. Dirt kicks up from the floor as Beau keeps pacing. 

The walls are too thick for even Beau to punch through. Fucking rich pieces of shit, even their holding pens for _drunks_ have stone walls. Who has the money for stone walls for drunk tanks? These assholes, apparently.

She kicks at the bars in frustration. They’re too sturdy, too, and the cell isn’t a pit that she can just climb out of.

A hand on her shoulder startles her.

“Beau. Beau, what’s the matter?” Jester’s all but holding her in place.

She taps her foot, just to have some movement.

“We gotta go, Jess. We gotta find a way out of here, right now.”

“Beau, why? They’re just going to hold us until morning.We’re not in any actual trouble, it’s okay.”

“No, you don’t get it! It’s my fault that you’re in here, and that’s going to be a cover for something and they’re going to take you away and you’ll hate me. You’ll realize this is my fault and you’ll fucking hate me unless we leave right this second. We have to _go.”_

Now that she’s standing still, the booze is going to Beau’s head. The cell is starting to sway. Something wet is on her face. She may be crying.

“Beau. Beau, you need to sit down.” Jester’s other hand comes to rest on her other shoulder. Beau lets herself be steered onto the prison bench. The need to _go_ is still pressing, but the room won’t stop spinning and Jester’s pretty strong.

“Oh, Beau.” Jester tilts her chin up. Beau wants a kiss very badly, but she also definitely doesn’t deserve one right now. She got her girlfriend arrested, no kisses for her.

Jester reads her mind though, bless her, and kisses her on the forehead.

“You’re too drunk for this, gimme one second,” Jester mutters an incantation and Beau feels the alcohol pull from her skin.

The restless anxiety still pulses beneath her skin, but without the alcohol the spinning of the room stops. The fear clarifies to a more reasonable point, though she still wants to claw her skin off with the desire to leave.

“Better?” Jester says.

“Much. I shouldn’t have gotten you into this mess, I’m sorry. I’ll get us out. I can think better now, we just have to—”

Jester cuts her off. “Beau, I love you, but I think we should stay here unless you know something else. They said we could leave in the morning, just that you were too drunk to be out. And then I tried to cast magic and they got mad, that’s all. The Bright Queen might be upset if we break out of her prison. We should stay.” 

“I just— What if it isn’t? What if this ends up being something bigger than that?”

“Then we deal with it when it does. What’s going on?” Jester’s keep one hand rubbing small circles on Beau’s back.

That, combined with the magically induced sobering up, is helping clear Beau’s head. She’s coming around to the idea that leaving might not be the most rational decision here.

“This is, this is too close to something that happened before. The prison, it being my fault you got arrested, all of it.” 

“What happened before?” Jester’s quieter, and she shifts to look up at Beau while she starts talking. 

“I, uh, back when I was doing more illegal shit with less people. I had a girlfriend, Tori, she did crime with me. We both got arrested and uh— I think my dad pulled something. She got separated from me, and I got out. I never saw her again. She definitely hates me now.” Beau pushes sweaty hair back from her forehead.

“Beau, that’s super awful. I’m sorry that happened, but I really think we’re going to be okay. Besides, even if that did happen I wouldn’t hate you or stay gone.”

“You wouldn’t hate me even if I got your ass kicked?”

“No! You didn’t do it alone. I wanted to go with you, I thought it would be fun! Even if you did, I love you, and I don’t want to leave even if it means being roommates in a shitty prison cell.”

Beau laughs, just a little, and the knot in her chest loosens.

“Thanks, Jess. Hey, this might actually be nicer than Labenda anyways,” 

Jester snorts, and even more of the urgency fades from Beau. So long as Jester keeps joking with her, keeps leaning against her, and keeps her distracted, she just might make it through this night.


End file.
